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The 3D Printed Homes of the Future Are Giant Eggs on Mars:
It doesn’t get much more futuristic than living on Mars—and guess what? There’s a 3D printed home for that, too. In fact, there are a few; last year saw the conclusion of a contest held by NASA called the 3D Printed Habitat Challenge.
[...] The top prize ($500,000) went to AI Space Factory, a New York-based architecture and construction technologies company focused on building for space exploration. Their dual-shell, four-level design is called Marsha, and unlike Martian habitats we’ve seen on the big screen or read about in sci-fi novels, it’s neither a dome nor an underground bunker. In fact, it sits fully above ground and it looks like a cross between a hive and a giant egg.
The team chose the hive-egg shape very deliberately, saying that it’s not only optimized to handle the pressure and temperature demands of the Martian atmosphere, but building it with a 3D printer will be easier because the printer won’t have to move around as much as it would to build a structure with a larger footprint. That means less risk of errors and a faster building speed.
The building material would combine basalt fiber and bioplastics made from plants grown on Mars.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Friday July 10 2020, @02:14PM (2 children)
Could useful energy be obtained by
attachingfascinating solar panels to the correct portions of exterior round structure? The path of the sun is predictable and stable.To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Friday July 10 2020, @02:58PM (1 child)
Path of the sun might be predictable and stable, but access to it (i.e. visibility) definitely isn't on Mars. Solar panels will need to be in a maintainable (think cleaning dust off) location and have massive battery backup for weeks-long dust storms. You probably want multiple redundant power (solar + battery) installations some distance from the habitats in case of battery fires - not sure if e.g. LiON will burn in Mars atmosphere, but the batteries do have oxygen in them and you definitely wouldn't want them in (or near) habitat. May be easier and cheaper (read: lighter overall) to ship a nuke battery or reactor out there than the required battery backup. Of course if you can make batteries and panels from Mars materials then go for that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday July 10 2020, @06:46PM
Batteries are definitely off the table for Mars until it gets local production - they're too heavy to transport in useful amounts. Waste processing could yield gases that may be useful as fuel, or they could be refined biofuels from algae, or maybe a GMO yeast or fungus.